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Elon Musk vs. The Times: Why This Can't End Well for Tesla

"Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel." That line, often misattributed to Mark Twain, used to mean something in the glory days of newspapers. Ink was a scarce commodity, as were presses and trucks; you couldn't very well print or distribute as many copies of your version of the facts as the New York Times could.

Electrons, however, are the opposite of scarce. In the era of social media, you have just as many potential listeners for your argument as those ink-slinging hacks, especially if you're futuristic entrepreneur extraordinaire. And so it was that Elon Musk, normally a very cautious interviewee, decided to fire indiscriminately at the New York Times when it published an account of breaking down in a Tesla Model S between charging stations.

In particular, Musk threw a word that is kryptonite to any self-respecting journalist: "fake." The Grey Lady was never going to stand for that, especially not when the memory of Jayson Blair still rankles.

Battle broke out in earnest when Tesla published a post revealing logs from the writer's journey. It reached fever pitch on Thursday, with the Times publishing multiple reasoned responses to Tesla's logs — proving that the sheer weight of its words can still beat those of a corporate opponent, even if the price of ink is no longer the main reason.

It is unclear at this stage how Tesla can win this he-said-they-said battle, not to mention the larger PR war. Musk has made a number of unforced errors. The logs he published were no knockout punch and the Times is responding methodically to each charge. And at every step, potential customers are receiving constant reminders of a single undisputed moment in the story: a Tesla Model S in the bitter cold, out of juice, on the back of a flatbed truck.

Tesla's Troubles

This is a precarious time for Tesla. The electric car maker badly needs a hit product. It ran out of parts to build the Roadster in 2012. The Model S is an undeniably awesome award-winning car, and most of its users rave about how it gives you a real 21st century thrill to drive it. But among would-be buyers, questions persist about charging stations: how easy they are to find; how fast they are to use.

Disproportionately, those would-be buyers are among the above average income-earning, left-leaning readers of the New York Times. And for non-readers — well, the Grey Lady's word on something can still become a national story, even in this age of electrons.

You can see why Musk felt he had to fire back, even at the risk of making it a larger story. The reputation of the Model S, which only started rolling off the factory floor in June, is at stake. This is the kind of defining moment that consumers remember.

Musk was also once-bitten, twice-angry. The UK TV show Top Gear filmed a segment in 2008 that left the impression a Tesla Roadster had lost its charge after 55 miles. It hadn't, and the presenter Jeremy Clarkson is an over-the-top character full of anti-electric car opinions, so Musk sued. And lost, largely because Top Gear is an entertainment show.

Musk's first unforced error, therefore, was conflating Top Gear and the New York Times. As far as standards, ethics and outlook go, they couldn't be further apart.

Big Tesla is Watching You

The second error flows from the first:

Tesla data logging is only turned on with explicit written permission from customers, but after Top Gear BS, we always keep it on for media.

Would you buy a computer if you knew the manufacturer could keep tabs on exactly how you used it? What about if they said they needed your permission first? How would you feel if you read a story where the reviewer didn't like the machine, and then the company revealed they'd been tracking how the reviewer used it all along?

Even those of us who don't have so many concerns about privacy in a world that's full of high-tech trails — myself included — have to admit the situation doesn't look good for Tesla. There's a certain Big Brother vengefulness to this behavior. It has already become a meme on Twitter. Take this Back to the Future joke:

In any case, the Times has seized the moral high ground again by calling for Tesla to release the full unedited logs of the journey. The company thus far appears reticent to do so.

The Human Factor

I remember reviewing a short-lived desktop computer from Apple in 2000, called the Cube. It was a gorgeous-looking machine, a brushed-metal brain in a clear perspex box. Just one problem: brushing my hand against the touch-sensitive power button on the top would switch it off.

Was that my bad? Absolutely. Should the designer have accounted for such potential mistakes? You're darn right. In my review, I wrote that the Cube "seems to be asking for a perfect human to operate it."

The more this back-and-forth between the Times and Tesla focuses on the small stuff the writer did outside the scope of the review — he took a two-mile detour into Manhattan, he drove above the speed limit once, he didn't charge for a full hour, he didn't turn down the in-car temperature to save the battery — the more sympathetic the reviewer becomes. Who here hasn't ever broken the speed limit or taken a detour?

If the Model S only works if you drive below the speed limit between charging stations, if you have to charge it all the way every time, if you need to follow the advice of Tesla PR reps to the letter at every juncture — whether or not the writer did — then it is a car that is asking for a perfect human to operate it.

Electric Dreams

I write all of this with a heavy heart. I'm no Jeremy Clarkson. I really want Tesla to succeed, and if I could replace every gas-guzzling sedan on the planet with a Model S tomorrow, I would. Electric cars have far faster acceleration, far quieter engines, and they're about a million times better for the planet (even though their electricity is largely generated by coal-fired power stations).

That's exactly why Tesla has to put the Times story behind it as fast as possible. I implore Musk: release the full logs and be done. Focus instead on putting more reviewers behind the wheel of a Model S. Don't leave it to one or two lucky journalists; flood the market with reviews. Accept that one or two might have bad experiences; that's okay. Let them. What matters is making it appear that the Model S is everywhere, on every road, in every publication; not unimpeachable, just impossible to ignore.

In the age of the electron, what really matters — what wins every time — is opinion in aggregate.

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